Sand, Sunburns, and Salt Water
by RheatheHadley
Summary: Five different fluffy beach moments: sand volleyball, ice cream, sandcastles, seashells, and surfing. (Just a Klance beach au I wrote for my 13 year old cousin who lives in Hawaii and loves Klance 3)


5.

Keith was definitely not enjoying his summer. His grandmas had recently bought a summer beach house and invited both him and Shiro to stay for the summer. Shiro eagerly accepted the invitation, so Keith had no choice but to go along with it. It wasn't that Keith didn't love his grandmas – because he did. It was the beach he had a problem with. On occasion, he could put up with the annoyances of the beach. But every day? The lifeguard at the local beach was a girl named Allura. Miles of sun kissed skin contrasted her waves on long white hair. The first time Shiro saw her, he tripped and got a mouth full of sand, and every time since he was reduced to a stuttering, blushing mess that Allura found rather cute. So, because of Allura, Keith was now getting dragged to the beach daily.

"Really Shiro?" Keith asked. "Do I have to go with you? Can't you just go by yourself?"

"Please Keith? I really like her, and if I go alone I might seem desperate to talk to her," Shiro pouted.

Keith rolled his eyes, but reluctantly agreed. After all, Shiro would do anything Keith asked, so it was only fair that he returned the favor.

Now, he currently sat on the beach, feeling the sun burn his shoulders and back. Sunscreen could only do so much when your skin tone was akin to porcelain. His dark hair had enough sand in it to build a small sandcastle. When he ran his hand through it, it sprinkled heavily into his lap. By the look on his face, anyone could tell he was miserable. Shiro, on the other hand, looked perfectly content standing next to the lifeguard tower flirting with Allura.

Keith grumbled and lay back on his beach towel. He'd thought about bringing the book he'd been reading, but he didn't want to ruin it by getting sand in the pages so he'd left it at home. Napping sounded nice, but Keith wasn't comfortable napping in public surrounded by strangers. The heat had him craving some ice cream, but there were too many sticky children surrounding the dessert stand and he didn't think he could face that alone. So he sat alone on his beach towel, absentmindedly listening to the women next to him gossip about their husbands.

Just as Tricia began to complain about how John never picked the kids up from practice, something struck him on the side of the head and sent him sprawling into the sand. He sat back up, shaking off the blow and shaking more and out of his hair, when he heard someone running across the sand.

"Oh my gosh, that was the worst hit I've ever done in my life. Are you okay?"

Keith looked up at the source of the voice, squinting against the brightness of the sun. "Yeah I'm fine."

The guy plopped down next to him. "Oh thank god. I totally did not mean to hit you. I was trying to hit someone else, but then some kid threw his beach ball at me, and it got all messed up."

Keith looked at the guy. Dark skin, blinding smile, short brown hair, obnoxiously blue swim trunks. What really caught Keith's attention was the smattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose. He must have really spent a lot of time out in the sun, and instead of getting burned like Keith, was rewarded with cute little spots that drew attention to his nice eyes.

Wait, nice eyes? Keith blinked and shook his head. No way did he think this random guy that had just hit him in the head with a volleyball had nice eyes.

The guy seemed to notice his awkward staring. "Are you sure you're okay?" He asked again.

"I said I'm fine," Keith grumbled. "Why don't you go back to your game?"

The guy shrugged. "I guess I could head back over there, but that would mean leaving you over here by yourself."

Keith glared at him. "And? I'm a big kid, I can look after myself."

"Of course you can," the guy rolled his eyes. "I just meant that you looked really bored. And if you're going to be out here getting the worst sunburn of all time, you might as well have some fun while doing it."

He did make a good point. Keith looked in the direction he'd come from. A volleyball net was set up not too far away, and the people on the makeshift court were looking over in their direction, waiting for their friend to return the ball.

Keith look back at the guy in front of him and shrugged. "Sure, why not."

The guy smiled again, picked up the volleyball, stood, and extended a hand to Keith. The long hair boy let the other pull him to his feet. "I'm Keith, by the way."

The guy, already smiling, just smiled bigger and brighter. "I'm Lance." He then gestured over to people on the far side of the net. "Those are my friends. Hunk is the one with the orange headband, and Pidge is the one with the crazy hair and glasses."

When they got over there, introductions were made and everyone seemed ready to get back to the game. "So Keith," Pidge asked, "you ever played before?"

"Not on sand, but yeah."

"Good," she said. "The only difference is that you can't move so fast, so you have to rely a lot on your teammates. Hunk and I will play back row. You and Lance play up front. Got it?"

Keith nodded and the game began. They were playing the first to twenty points. Hunk served first and Keith immediately understood why they had him in the back row. With that much power, any hit from the front row would have immediately gone out of bounds. On the return volley, he understood why Pidge was back there too. She was closer to the ground than any of them, which made it a lot easier for her to reach the ball before it reached the sand. Her pass floated over to him nicely, and he set it over to Lance. It wasn't perfect since it had been a while since he'd last played, but it got enough height. Lance anticipated it nicely, already jumping and pulling his hand back to meet the ball. His swing was fast, and before Keith really noticed, the ball was buried in the sand on the other side of the net.

"That was incredible!" Keith exclaimed. "I haven't seen a hit like that in ages. Where do you learn to play?"

Lance gestured to the sand around them. "You're looking at it. I don't live far from here, and my sisters taught me to play sand volleyball as soon as I could walk. I've never played on an actual court."

"That's awesome," Keith said. Shiro had taught him to play baseball when he was younger, but he'd picked up volleyball on his own. It had been a struggle since no one thought he'd be tall enough to play front row, but he'd proved them all wrong and become an excellent setter.

The ball was tossed back over to the and Hunk made another excellent serve, but the other team stopped it from reaching the sand. On the return volley, however, Lance launched himself into the air and blocked it. Keith tried not to stare.

The game continued in this fashion for a while, with Keith setting the ball to Lance and the dark-skinned boy launching himself into the air and spiking it with great accuracy. And it was working great, racking up points left and right, until Pidge messed up one of her digs and sent it to Lance instead. He managed to get under it and set it up, but that meant it was up to Keith to hit it. He took a deep breath and jumped as high as he could, pulling his hand back while he did so. When he finally let himself swing, he just prayed he wouldn't send the ball into the net and embarrass himself. His hand hit the ball, sending it towards the other team, and it cleared the inch by no more than an inch. The other team wasn't expecting it to go over, and so the ball buried into the sand with no resistance. That made twenty points.

Pidge and Hunk began to cheer in the back row, doing a happy dance, and Keith was getting ready to join their shenanigans until he felt two arm circle his waist, lift him, and spin his around. It was Lance of course, and the taller boy whooped and hollered about their victory until the other team slunk of in shame. He promised to get them all ice cream to celebrate.

With Lance's arms wrapped around his waist and his smiled pressed into his back, Keith was pretty glad that volleyball had hit him in the head.

4.

It had been a few days since the sand volleyball game, and Keith hadn't seen Pidge, Hunk, or Lance at the beach since then. He was trying not to let it bother him, but with Shiro making sickening googly eyes at Allura every two seconds, Keith would do anything for a distraction. With nothing better to do, he settled for absentmindedly watching the surfers in the distance.

He'd just watched some guy wipe out when a shadow fell on him from behind and a familiar voice spoke up. "I see you're still working on that lovely sunburn of yours."

Keith fought down his embarrassing grin before turning to face him. "Lance, long time no see."

Lance sat next to him, burying his toes in the hot sand. "Yeah, sorry about that. I wanted to come see if you'd be here, but my mom's had me running errands like crazy these past few days. Though, I suppose it can't be helped when you have seven siblings."

"Seven?" Keith asked, a little dumbfounded.

"Yup, three older than me and three younger. I'm the dreaded middle child." He sighed. "What about you?"

The shorter boy responded with a shrug. "It's just me and Shiro." He pointed over to the lifeguard stand where the older boy brushed his white tuft of hair out of his face and kept chatting with Allura.

"Him?" Lance asked, his jaw dropping as he took in Shiro's height and muscle tone. "But, but he's - and you're-"

"I'm adopted," Keith explained.

"Ah," Lance said, looking significantly more awkward than he did a moment ago. Keith hated it. He didn't mean to make the other more uncomfortable, he was just stating facts.

"Hey," Keith said, "you're shit at keeping promises."

"Huh?" Lance asked, the awkwardness on his face replaced with confusing. Success.

"You heard me. I was promised ice cream after we won the game, and guess who never got any."

Lance grinned. "Well then, I guess we'll just have to fix that, now won't we?"

Both boys stood and brushed the sand off their pants before heading in the direction of the ice cream stand. Keith looked around as they walked, waiting to spot the familiar orang headband and mop on unruly hair. He didn't see them. "Where are Hunk and Pidge?" He asked.

"They're not here today. They're actually at home building a mini rocket."

"A rocket?" Keith asked. "Sounds like fun. Were you not invited?"

"I was," Lance said, "but I decided to come down here instead. They build rockets all the time, but I didn't know if I'd be seeing you here again."

Keith blushed, hoping Lance wouldn't notice it underneath his horrid sunburn.

Thankfully there were no sticky children in line at the moment and they were able to order right away, vanilla for Lance and strawberry for Keith. Then they walked to the benches off to the side and took a seat.

"You know, I'm glad you decided to not build rockets today."

"Really?" Lance said, happy surprise coloring his voice.

Keith nodded. "Yeah, because if you had, I would have had to pay for my own ice cream."

Lance's mouth dropped open at Keith's epic dis and Keith snorted while eating his ice cream, the look on his face too hilarious.

The taller boy's gaze zeroed in on the side of Keith's mouth, and a puzzled expression crosses Keith's face. "What is it?"

He shook his head. "Nothing, it's just – you've got some –" He reached out and swiped his thumb across the corner of Keith's lips, collecting the ice cream there. Then he brought his thumb to his own mouth and licked the trace of pink away. "Strawberry. Delicious" He said.

There was no way Lance mistook Keith's blush for sunburn this time.

3.

They're at the beach again, Pidge and Hunk with them this time, and the shortest member of their group keeps staring at the kids playing a few feet away.

"Pidge, what're you doing? If you keep glaring at those kids like that their moms might come and yell at us and I really don't want to get yelled at by angry beach moms today." Hunk said.

Pidge rolled her eyes. "Relax Hunk. I'm not looking at them, I'm looking at their sandcastle." It was a small sandcastle, rather pitiful actually. The kids hadn't gotten the sand wet enough, so every time they tried adding on to it, other parts kept falling down. "We really could do a much better job."

"Of course we could Pidge, but they're kids," Hunk said. "I think they're doing pretty good for people their age."

Keith looked at the sand castle and laughed. "Really? Those kids are like twelve. They should be able to do better than that."

Pidge laughed. "Honestly Keith, I doubt you and Lance could build a better sandcastle than them."

"Oh really?" Lance asked, a smirk rising to his lips. He looked over to Keith, who nodded to him. "Alright then, Mullet and I accept your challenge. The two of us versus you and Hunk, whoever loses has to buy the others ice cream. Deal?"

Pidge grinned a little manically and Hunk gulped nervously. "Deal," they said.

They gathered some stray buckets, soaked two patched of sand, and got to work. Pidge and Hunk began by setting up a nice level foundation for their sandcastle, while Keith and Lance decided a moat was their number one priority. Keith began on one side and Lance on the other. The shorter boy gently scooped his out and set it off to the side so they could use the sand later to build the actual castle. Lance, on the other hand, scooped and proceeded to toss the sand over his shoulder… right onto Keith's head.

The handful on sand smacked Keith on the back of the head, and when he turned to yell at Lance, he got another handful to the face. He sputtered and spat the sand out of his mouth. "Lance! What the hell are you doing?"

The taller boy turned around to find Keith covered in sand. He started laughing uncontrollably and Keith grumbled.

"You think this is funny?" He growled.

Lance laughed harder. "I think it's hilarious."

"I'll show you hilarious," Keith muttered, and then he pounced. Lance squawked indignantly before fighting back. They wrestled in the sand, rolling this way and that as each boy fought for the upper hand. Eventually, Keith was able to effectively pin him down… right on top of Hunk and Pidge's sandcastle.

"Hey! You idiots, look what you've done!" Pidge groaned. Hunk just laughed good-naturedly.

Keith ignored them, settling his weight across Lance's waist where he'd straddled him and kept his arms pinned above his head. "Apologize!" He yelled, but the effect was diminished by the way he couldn't stop smiling.

Lance huffed. "Fine, I'm sorry for getting sand in your pretty hair. Now I don't suppose you could release me? I'd rather not have angry beach moms yell at us for our suggestive position."

Keith became all too aware of how he had Lance pinned beneath him, and rolled off him quicker than he'd ever done anything in his life. Lance stayed sprawled across the sand, laughing as Keith once again flushed a brilliant shade of red.

2.

"Guys, do you think we could search for some seashells today? I promised my little sister I'd get some for her." Hunk asked.

Pidge shrugged, "I don't see why not."

"Yeah Hunk, that's actually an excellence idea!" Lance smiled. "And I know the best place to find some good ones. What do you say, Keith?"

"It's fine with me," Keith shrugged. "I just need to let me brother know I'm leaving this part of the beach so he doesn't freak out when he can't find me."

While the others waited for him, Keith stomped over to where Shiro was loitering by the lifeguard tower. "Hey," he called.

Shiro looked over to him and smiled. "What's up?"

"I'm going down the beach a ways with my friends. We're gonna find some seashells, I thought I'd let you know."

Shiro looked over Keith's shoulder to where the others were waiting for him and smiled. "I appreciate the heads up. Go have some fun."

Keith turned back to the others and gave them a thumbs-up. Then they grabbed some buckets and were off.

Apparently, Lance's amazing seashell spot was the collection of tide pools about half a mile away. "I used to come here with my older siblings when I was younger." He explained. "We used to collect shells and make necklaces out of them."

"That's a great idea! I'll have to do that for my little sister." Hunk said.

"Well," Keith said, "we might as well get started." He took a step towards the tide pools before a hand on his shoulder stopped him. He turned to find Lance frowning at him.

"Really Keith? I'm disappointed in you." He shook his head.

"I don't understand." Keith frowned. "I thought we came to look for shells?"

"Duh, but we can't just _look_ for them. Where's the fun in that? No, we need a competition." He grinned.

Hunk groaned. "Lance, do you have to turn everything into a competition?"

"Hunk, you know with seven siblings, competing is the only way to get anything. So, here's what we're going to do. We get one hour to find as many seashells as we can. At the end of the hour, we meet right here with our buckets. Whoever's bucket is the fullest wins."

"Sounds easy enough," Keith said.

Lance nodded. "Alright, Pidge can you set the timer on your magic water proof watch?"

She fiddled with the device for a moment before giving him a thumbs-up. "Timer's set."

"Alright then, on your mark… get set… GO!"

They all leapt into the tide pools and began a mad scramble for shells. Hunk search on his hands and knees. Pidge felt around in the sand with her toes. And Keith followed Lance. Since he's lived by the beach and come here when he was younger, the raven-haired boy figured Lance would know where to find all the best ones. The only problem was that Lance kept finding them first. Honestly though, Keith was surprised it took Lance twenty minutes to realize Keith was swiping shells from his bucket. His response was a loud shriek and a threat to drown the shorter boy if he tried it again.

Once Pidge's watched beeped, they all met back up at the starting point and measured the bucket levels. Pidge came in last, Keith got third, Hunk claimed second, and Lance (of course) won by a landslide.

He smirked and puffed out his chest. "So? That's how the master does it. I bet you've never seen shell collecting skills like that before. I've been –"

Keith made eye contact with Pidge over Lance's shoulder and rolled his eyes. Pidge just held something up with a mischievous glint in her eyes. Keith struggled to keep a straight face as Pidge snuck up behind Lance, who was still in the middle of his victory gloat, and dropped a hermit crab in the back of his swim trunks. The resulting scream was loud enough to scare away several birds and bring Hunk, Pidge, and Keith to their knees with laughter.

Keith brushed tears out of his eyes as he watched Lance struggle to get the foreign critter out of his trunks. When he finally succeeded and flung it out to the furthest tide pools, he slumped down in the sand next to Keith.

"You guys are so mean," he grumbled.

Keith just patted his shoulder and smiled.

1.

"You know guys," Lance said, "we've been coming to the beach for days and doing a bunch of different stuff, but we haven't really gone out in the water yet."

Pidge looked puzzled. "Yeah we have. We've been in the water loads of times."

"Not really," Lance argued. "We haven't gone out very far. I haven't seen Keith go out any more than waist deep."

"Well, we do only have two surf boards." Hunk pointed out. "We can't all go out at the same time. But we can take turns if you like?"

Lance nodded enthusiastically because he absolutely adored surfing. Pidge responded with an indifferent shrug, saying "Yeah, I could surf."

Keith, on the other hand, politely declined, which was very much not like him. "I'll pass. But you guys go ahead."

Lance frowned at him. "Are you serious? You're really not going to come surfing with us?"

Keith shook his head, but Lance didn't back down. "But Keith, I love surfing! It's one of my favorite things in the whole world!"

Again, Keith shook his head. Lance grinned as he began to formulate a plan.

"Come on Keith, it's not like the water is anything to be _afraid_ of," he teased. "Is that it? Are you _afraid_? Because like I said earlier, I haven't seen you go out far at all."

Keith glared at him, but he had that competitive glint in his eyes, the one that Lance was beginning to love. Surfing was amazing, and Lance knew Keith would see that once he got over his fear of the waves. He wanted to shorter boy to love surfing like he did, and if he had to goad Keith into that realization, what was the harm? Keith would probably thank him when it was all said and done.

"You know what," Keith growled. "Fine, I'll go surfing with you idiots. Is that what you want?"

Lance smiled wide and nodded. The harshness began to fade from Keith's face once he saw the happiness on Lance's. If this would make Lance happy, he would try it.

"I've never surfed before, so you have to go first and show me how it's done, okay?"

Hunk shook his head. "Guys, I'm not sure this is such a good idea." Pidge readily agree with him.

Lance just waved them off. He and Keith grabbed the boards and waded out into the water. When Lanced got on his, Keith mirrored his actions and did the same. Then they paddled out. Lance was rattling on about his first time surfing, but Keith wasn't really paying attention. His focus was on Lance's arms, watching the way he cut into the water with his hands. He did his best to copy the action.

Keith wasn't scared of the waves, specifically, he was just scared of the water in general. He'd lived in a landlocked state his whole life and his parents could afford to get him and Shiro a pool when they were younger, so Keith never learned how to swim.

 _But surfing is different than swimming_ , Keith argued with himself. _The board floats, so as long as you stay on the board, you can't drown._

Keith hung back as Lance swum out to meet the first wave. He watched his movements carefully, paying close attention to how he dove under the water first before popping back up to ride the wave. It didn't look easy, but it's didn't look too terribly hard either.

Lance swam back over to meet him. "Your turn."

Keith swallowed stifle and paddled out to meet the next wave. He watched the water swell as he got closer, took a deep breath, and dove under, just as he'd seen Lance do. He gripped the board tightly with both hands, knowing that as long as he held on it would bring him back to the surface. It brought him back up alright, but his timing had been off, and the wave plowed into him just as he was surfacing. He hadn't been expecting the force of the water, and it knocked him back under. As the water pulled on him and thrashed him about, his hands lost their grip on the board. Keith began to panic and kick, not knowing which way would lead him to air. Because that's what he needed. His lungs burned and his chest felt tight. He didn't have enough air. He reached out, hoping his hands might brush the board, but there was nothing. He tried to bite back the gasp that was bubbling up from deep inside him, but his lungs wanted oxygen, and there was nothing he could do to stop them from trying to get it. His mouth open and he inhaled. Salt water rushed in to the place oxygen should be and unconsciousness took over.

}!{

Consciousness flowed back into him as salt water flowed out. Though, flowed might have been to gentle of a word. Keith rolled onto his side, coughing and retching, his body having a hard time drawing in air after having been without it. The sand was hot beneath his body and the sun was bright above. It was these two things that made Keith realize he was decidedly not dead.

There was a heavy exhale. "Oh thank god."

Keith looked around for the sound of the voice and found Lance kneeling next to him. "I thought I was too late. You almost died, and it was completely my fault. I just wanted to go surfing with you, but I was too stupid to realize you can't swim and you almost died and –"

Lance was silenced by a hand on his wrist. "You saved me?" Keith winced at the gravelly sound of his voice.

Lance nodded. "Yeah, but it doesn't really count since I'm the one that almost killed you in the first place."

"You know," Keith said, quiet enough that it came out like a whisper, "if you wanted to kiss me, all you had to do was ask."

Lance's eyes were watering, but he barked out a laugh. Then he leaned back over Keith and pressed an actual kiss to his lips, ever so gentle. Lance could still taste salt water, but a voice in the back of his mind whispered _maybe the next time you kiss him, he'll taste like strawberry ice cream_.


End file.
